Coronavirus Outbreak

[Ken]

The idea that viruses would wipe out the human race without modern technology (in the case of COVID, technology less than a year old) seems patently absurd.

Yes, that does seem patently absurd. Which is why absolutely no one has ever made that claim.

We would be best off letting our immune systems lead us to herd immunity, just like happens with other species, and just like the human race has done for most of its existence.

Nostalgic for the days of smallpox, polio, bubonic plague are we?

[nett]

How did the Spanish flu end then?

It never really ended. What ended were the deadliest aspects of that particular pandemic, the parallel bacterial infections. The 1918 flu strain is still around in various forms and infects millions every year:

But the strand of the flu didn’t just disappear. The influenza virus continuously mutated, passing through humans, pigs and other mammals. The pandemic-level virus morphed into just another seasonal flu. Descendants of the 1918 H1N1 virus make up the influenza viruses we’re fighting today.

“The 1918 flu is still with us, in that sense,” said Ann Reid, the executive director of the National Center for Science Education who successfully sequenced the genetic makeup of the 1918 influenza virus in the 1990s. “It never went away.”

. . . .

The longer the influenza virus existed in a certain community, the less lethal the sickness was. An epidemiological study cited by Barry in “The Great Influenza” noted that “the virus was most virulent or most readily communicable when it first reached the state, and thereafter it became generally attenuated.”

Experts say there’s this natural progression where a virus often — but not always — becomes less lethal as time wears on. It’s in the best interest of the virus for it to spread before killing the host.

“The natural order of an influenza virus is to change,” Barry told The Post. “It seems most likely that it simply mutated in the direction of other influenza viruses, which is considerably milder.”

By 1920, the influenza virus was still a threat, but fewer people were dying from the disease. Some scientists at the time started to move on to other research. Barry wrote that William Henry Welch, a famous pathologist from Johns Hopkins who was studying the virus, found it “humiliating” that the outbreak was passing away without experts truly understanding the underlying cause of the disease.

What Welch didn’t predict was that the virus never truly went away. In 2009, David Morens and Jeffery Taubenberger — two influenza experts at the National Institutes of Health — co-authored an article with Anthony S. Fauci explaining how the descendants of the 1918 influenza virus have contributed to a “pandemic era” that has lasted the past hundred years. At the time the article was published, the H1N1 influenza virus in public circulation was a fourth-generation descendant of the novel virus from 1918.

“All those pandemics that have happened since — 1957, 1968, 2009 — all those pandemics are derivatives of the 1918 flu,” Taubenberger told The Post. “The flu viruses that people get this year, or last year, are all still directly related to the 1918 ancestor.”

Because of this, the 1918 influenza outbreak doesn’t come with a neat bookend. Society moved on, but the virus continued in some form or fashion.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/ ... demic-end/

um...what? Last I checked 50m people aren't dying yearly due to the flu. Why did the pandemic end if humans are unable to develop immunity to viruses?

[Ken]

How did the Spanish flu end then?

It never really ended. What ended were the deadliest aspects of that particular pandemic, the parallel bacterial infections. The 1918 flu strain is still around in various forms and infects millions every year:

But the strand of the flu didn’t just disappear. The influenza virus continuously mutated, passing through humans, pigs and other mammals. The pandemic-level virus morphed into just another seasonal flu. Descendants of the 1918 H1N1 virus make up the influenza viruses we’re fighting today.

“The 1918 flu is still with us, in that sense,” said Ann Reid, the executive director of the National Center for Science Education who successfully sequenced the genetic makeup of the 1918 influenza virus in the 1990s. “It never went away.”

. . . .

The longer the influenza virus existed in a certain community, the less lethal the sickness was. An epidemiological study cited by Barry in “The Great Influenza” noted that “the virus was most virulent or most readily communicable when it first reached the state, and thereafter it became generally attenuated.”

Experts say there’s this natural progression where a virus often — but not always — becomes less lethal as time wears on. It’s in the best interest of the virus for it to spread before killing the host.

“The natural order of an influenza virus is to change,” Barry told The Post. “It seems most likely that it simply mutated in the direction of other influenza viruses, which is considerably milder.”

By 1920, the influenza virus was still a threat, but fewer people were dying from the disease. Some scientists at the time started to move on to other research. Barry wrote that William Henry Welch, a famous pathologist from Johns Hopkins who was studying the virus, found it “humiliating” that the outbreak was passing away without experts truly understanding the underlying cause of the disease.

What Welch didn’t predict was that the virus never truly went away. In 2009, David Morens and Jeffery Taubenberger — two influenza experts at the National Institutes of Health — co-authored an article with Anthony S. Fauci explaining how the descendants of the 1918 influenza virus have contributed to a “pandemic era” that has lasted the past hundred years. At the time the article was published, the H1N1 influenza virus in public circulation was a fourth-generation descendant of the novel virus from 1918.

“All those pandemics that have happened since — 1957, 1968, 2009 — all those pandemics are derivatives of the 1918 flu,” Taubenberger told The Post. “The flu viruses that people get this year, or last year, are all still directly related to the 1918 ancestor.”

Because of this, the 1918 influenza outbreak doesn’t come with a neat bookend. Society moved on, but the virus continued in some form or fashion.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/ ... demic-end/

um...what? Last I checked 50m people aren't dying yearly due to the flu. Why did the pandemic end if humans are unable to develop immunity to viruses?

1. They mostly weren't dying of the flu virus in the first place. They were mostly dying of parallel bacterial infections which are treatable with antibiotics. Are you clear about the differences between viruses and bacteria?

2. As the article explains, viruses naturally tend to evolve and mutate into less deadly forms over time. A virus that kills quickly has much more difficulty spreading among the population than one that lingers, causes mild sickness, but doesn't prevent infectious people from continuing to go about their daily lives to spread the disease to others. The Spanish Flu virus has mutated over time into less deadly variants. One hopes that the same will eventually be true with Covid as well.

[Robert]

The Spanish Flu virus has mutated over time into less deadly variants. One hopes that the same will eventually be true with Covid as well.

Since Covid started close to that, it should not take long to get there, unless it was genetically engineered and can not mutate as easily.

I still question that all those 500,000 deaths were directly caused by Covid. If so, then that points more towards an engineered virus that Dr Fauci and the Wuhan Lab were working on.

[Dan Z]

Daily new Covid cases are now at a number that is higher than both the first and second waves of the virus, and are still slowly increasing. Eventually this may have to be described as a fourth wave.

Increase of cases with a decrease of deaths is a good thing. Means those NOT vulnerable are being exposed, getting immune and going on, as we should have done 6-8 months ago.

Most he vulnerable have been vaccinated. If this wave is let alone, we will have herd immunity.

The increase of cases could be a result of a variant. Weren't we told early on the UK variant was more contagious (increase of cases) but less deadly (fewer deaths)

I think the consensus is strong that the UK variant is more contagious - I have heard some more recent studies point to the fact that it may, in fact, be somewhat more deadly.

[Dan Z]

It’s also better to have natural immunity across the population instead of vaccines, because then there is a wide range of protection of all the countless mutations/variants of the virus. Which is better than everyone simply having the same few vaccines, which conceivably could be rendered useless by a variant.

I wonder if that's true RZehr. If a variant outmaneuvers a vaccine, might it also outmaneuver natural immunity? Isn't this what happens with the annual flu cycle?

Your immune system is much more powerful and capable than scientists working in a lab to invent vaccines.

Makes sense intuitively - any data to back this thesis up?

[Biblical Anabaptist]

The Spanish Flu virus has mutated over time into less deadly variants. One hopes that the same will eventually be true with Covid as well.

Since Covid started close to that, it should not take long to get there, unless it was genetically engineered and can not mutate as easily.

I still question that all those 500,000 deaths were directly caused by Covid. If so, then that points more towards an engineered virus that Dr Fauci and the Wuhan Lab were working on.

IMO the 500,000 death figure was thrown around to create guilt feelings in those who did not mask 24/7 end accuse them of not caring and actively killing folks. I will be accused of being crass and uncaring for saying this, but if I calculate correctly that is .15% of the US population. I question whether the hysteria that has been fueled is justified.

[Robert]

Makes sense intuitively - any data to back this thesis up?

God made humans. Humans make vaccines. My hope is on God.

Short term vaccines are better. Long term herd immunity is better. It is part of the overall plan of creation.

So you playing the short game or long game?

I play the long game. God has it all sorted and heaven is much better than this world.

[Dan Z]

The Spanish Flu virus has mutated over time into less deadly variants. One hopes that the same will eventually be true with Covid as well.

Since Covid started close to that, it should not take long to get there, unless it was genetically engineered and can not mutate as easily.

I still question that all those 500,000 deaths were directly caused by Covid. If so, then that points more towards an engineered virus that Dr Fauci and the Wuhan Lab were working on.

IMO the 500,000 death figure was thrown around to create guilt feelings in those who did not mask 24/7 end accuse them of not caring and actively killing folks. I will be accused of being crass and uncaring for saying this, but if I calculate correctly that is .15% of the US population. I question whether the hysteria that has been fueled is justified.

Yes - in death terms the pandemic killed about .15% of the US population in 2020, but that becomes a pretty big number considering that in a normal (non pandemic) year just .88% of the population dies.

Think about this: Deaths in the US increased by about 18% last year over normal levels, creating the largest single year drop in life expectancy in the US since WWII. A disease that didn't exist a year earlier became the third leading cause of death in the US behind Cancer and Heart disease in 2020 (and probably 2021) - and by June it will have contributed to the deaths of nearly 600,000 lives. COVID has so far killed 1 out of every 573 Americans, and has seriously sickened many more than that.

[Biblical Anabaptist]

Since Covid started close to that, it should not take long to get there, unless it was genetically engineered and can not mutate as easily.

I still question that all those 500,000 deaths were directly caused by Covid. If so, then that points more towards an engineered virus that Dr Fauci and the Wuhan Lab were working on.

IMO the 500,000 death figure was thrown around to create guilt feelings in those who did not mask 24/7 end accuse them of not caring and actively killing folks. I will be accused of being crass and uncaring for saying this, but if I calculate correctly that is .15% of the US population. I question whether the hysteria that has been fueled is justified.

Yes - in death terms the pandemic killed about .15% of the US population in 2020, but that becomes a pretty big number considering that in a normal (non pandemic) year just .88% of the population dies.

Think about this: Deaths in the US increased by about 18% last year over normal levels, creating the largest single year drop in life expectancy in the US since WWII. A disease that didn't exist a year earlier became the third leading cause of death in the US behind Cancer and Heart disease in 2020 (and probably 2021) - and by June it will have contributed to the deaths of nearly 600,000 lives. COVID has so far killed 1 out of every 573 Americans, and has seriously sickened many more than that.

So what was the total death rate in 2020? I am not saying that I do not care about those who were seriously ill and died. I expect in the next several years the death rate will increase to nearly 1.1% or more as the baby boomers enter the "dying years. If I calculate correctly, to maintain a.88 death rate we will either need to have an average life expectancy of nearly 100 or the birth rate will need to increase.